Times, dates and days kind of loose meaning in a hospital, they are just numbers. You acclimatise to the rhythm and patterns of the hospital. The heartbeat of it, nurses handing over shifts at 8am and 8pm, doctors and surgeons doing their morning ward rounds anywhere between 8 and 12, physios and dieticians a bit later and the worst alarm clock in the world on this ward, is the phlebotomist waking you up at 7am to stick you with a needle and take your blood. At this hospital you have the addition of the dull rumble of the 2 thundering Pratt and Whitney engines of the London air ambulance lifting off or touching down on the roof of the adjoining building in all hours of daylight. Often lifting off just before, or at the very cusp of sunset to return to its base at RAF Northolt for the evening.

Time doesn’t mean much in here, what matters is has you improved from yesterday? Well a couple of days ago I woke up and vomited nearly a litre and half of bile, very quickly overflowing the bowl and coating the floor. If we were filming a reshoot of the exorcist the director would have called cut because special effects have gone overboard with the vomit and its not believable. Honestly I thought instead of a nurse I was going to get a young priest and an old priest just shouting “THE POWER OF CHRIST COMPELLS YOU!” For the last two days I haven’t woken up like that. So that’s an improvement.

I had been tube fed slowly overnight and that seems to have worked. The pump for the feed was very temperamental and kept stopping and starting, we found out later that is because the tube is basically blocked. So they tried me drinking my favourite meal replacement shakes again yesterday which seemed to have gone down ok, so I believe they may remove my tube today which would be lovely to be able to properly pick my nose again. Don’t judge me you all fucking do it! That and just to not have this fabulous piece of NHS face jewellery adorning me, as grateful as I am for it. It essentially has been keeping me alive so I can’t be too harsh on it.

I think I got very excited by the fact my incision was so small and it meant I was able to get up and about the day after surgery, my catheter was able to come out. Nobody enjoys those, if I just kink shamed you I’m not even sorry you should be ashamed. I have been up and about and pretty mobile with my surgeons parting words yesterday morning were “get up and walk today” so I’ve done multiple laps of the ward, shuffling along in my hospital issue red socks, dragging my rattling drip stand. I am however walking with a slight hunch because it feels like there is something tight in my incision preventing me from getting totally upright. I later found out that this is probably due to the two wound catheters I have that are sat in my tissue dispersing local anaesthetic at a constant rate. I am also due to loose these today but I feel like that will be a help not a hinderance. So with being up and about and being so chipper I think everyone has assumed it’s all gone well, and while yes the physical aspects of the surgery have gone well in themselves, I’m yet to try and eat anything substantial or solid and really we won’t know how successful this is really going to be until I start eating.

Man I am so optimistic this could work and give me my quality of life back, but I still have little voices that say “yeah but what if” and the most physical manifestation of this I guess has been having to see the pain team and them offering to see me long term should I need to. While I am very grateful for that offer, I kina thought the whole idea was I won’t need to see you guys, but I guess I have to acknowledge that it’s a very real possibility this might not work as well as expected. Only time will tell.

Well this morning the surgeons came round to see me. Full steam ahead. I’ve had half a bowl of porridge for breakfast and I’m having mash potatoes and gravy for lunch. Wound catheters are coming out. NG tube is highly likely coming out. Then words I did not expect to hear left my surgeons lips. “All goes well, I see no reason why we can’t send you home Saturday” I now feel like that child in the video asking if this is real life. Home within a week? This was not in my wildest dreams.  Suddenly time has a very new real meaning, I’ve still got to see gastro but I don’t see them saying anything drastic to keep me in, I think the only thing that would change that was if I started vomiting or couldn’t tolerate nutrition or some other drastic step backwards.

Porridge has gone down a treat. It was strange thought because it’s so ingrained into me now that eating is going to cause me issues for a minute I was like hrmm when does the pain or vomiting start? I had to stop and remind myself the whole fucking reason we are where we are is so that this hopefully doesn’t happen again. Honestly this hasn’t really sunk in yet, but I guess I’m also waiting to see the real proof in the pudding. I guess you can’t blame me for that after the last three years. This could be it. The end of all this shit and suffering. Getting my life back, shit I took for granted every day. I tell you one thing this illness has given me perspective in life that I probably wouldn’t have got otherwise without either some other type of traumatic experiences or years of age.

I look at life very differently to many people. I think when you have to look at your own mortality really hard it makes you change your values and thoughts about what is really important in life and what isn’t. Don’t sweat the small stuff man, it ain’t worth your time trust me. Go out and live your life now while you still have the chance to, you never know when you might not. No one wakes up planning to end up in A & E.

Go and make the most of it.

Carpe Diem